She is Sleeping

Hello everyone.

In my previous post, I started the exegesis of Luke 8:40-56. It tells the story of two miracles performed by Jesus after returning to the Isrealite side of the lake. Upon arrival there, Jesus is met by Jairus, a local synagogue leader, whose daughter was very sick.  Jairus came to Jesus in desparation, and Jesus afrees to go with him.  Everything stops however, when a woman secretly appraoches Jesus, beleiving that simply touching Jesus' clothing would bring her healing. 

She was right. So now with the woman taken care of, Jesus can turn his attention back to Jairus. But as Jesus is finishing up, someone comes from Jairus’ house and tells him that his daughter has died and that he should not trouble the teacher any further. Jesus basically ignores the statement and tells Jairus to “just have faith.” 

Jesus' statement to Jairus is interesting.  He has just been informed that his daughter is dead.  To Jairus, like most people, thought that it was too late.  Death is something people do not come back from, but Jesus assured him that she would be healed.  Could his daughter be healed from ‘dead’? Jairus is going to find out.  Being with Jesus does not follow the conventional rules and his daughter would live. 

When he gets to the house, Jesus announces that the girl was not dead, but sleeping. Luke says that the crowd laughs, which seems like an odd reaction for a group of mourners. Jesus ignored them. Mourners were called in only when someone is dead.  So it seems that these people were not particularly close to Jairus and the family, just people brought in to mourn.  This might explain the dramatic shift from mourning to laughing. 

Jesus takes only the parents, Peter, James and John with him.  Only they are allowed to witness the miracle. Going into the room where the little girl lay dead, Jesus takes her hand and tells her to get up. Luke records that her spirit returned to her and she got up.  Jesus then commands them to feed her, and then commands them not to tell anyone what had happened. The crowd of laughing mourners, however, knew that the girl was dead, and were bound to notice that she was now alive. 

Jesus, the one who came into the situation with all authority, had effectively silenced the scoffers. 

Tom